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Establishing Earth-based governance
for the rights of the environment
Linda Sheehan, Executive Director, Earth Law Center
P
eople and the planet stand at a crossroads, with climate
change forcing a definitive, immediate choice of paths.
Scientists overwhelmingly agree that ‘warming of the
climate system is unequivocal’
1
and that human activities
have been the driving force behind this increasingly dangerous
trend.
2
Independent energy experts conclude that ‘if stringent
new action is not forthcoming… all the CO
2
emissions allowed
in the 450 Scenario (2
o
C increase) up to 2035’ will have been
allocated by 2017.
3
In other words, without swift and decisive
action, the world is heading for irreversible climate change.
This urgent call for action is being echoed around the globe.
Depleted waterways, disappearing species and vanishing habitats
bear witness to the relentless pressures of an overarching economic
system that assumes the environment is property to be
used for the benefit of humans. This premise misses
the truth of our actual, inextricable interconnections
with the natural world, and it underlies a governance
system that will ultimately fail to ensure the well-being
of either people or planet.
The escalating depletion of the natural world also
puts at increasingly greater risk those growing human
populations without clean water, safe shelter, healthy
food or other basic necessities. Many of these become
‘environmental refugees’ and face similarly dire living
situations in overcrowded cities far from their home
communities. If this pattern continues, as a recent
report commissioned by the United States Secretary of
E
nvironment
:
legal
and
ethical
issues
Public march for ‘water for life, not for sale’, Marseille, France, March 2012
Image: Linda Sheehan